


kiss it better

by scorpionGrass



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:40:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27932479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scorpionGrass/pseuds/scorpionGrass
Summary: With their memories intact, the scars of the past feel fresh. Luckily, humans have a catch-all cure.
Relationships: Alit/Mizuki Kotori, Mizael/Tenjou Kaito, Tsukumo Yuuma/Vector
Comments: 37
Kudos: 24





	1. prologue

With their memories intact, the scars of the past feel fresh. Alit rubs at his neck, where the axe cut through and ended his life. His hand vices over where the cut had been, thumb caressing over tanned skin that’s smooth and unmarked, but Alit swears he can feel it still, the dark puckered line where his flesh had been torn asunder.

“I’m fine,” he says when Yuuma asks, like he hasn’t rubbed his skin red raw.

Mizael is the same, the arrows that had pierced him like phantom pains that had him out of service for weeks, lying in bed wrapped in thick blankets trying to sleep away the pain. Kaito’s the one who tells the others it could turn into bedsores, exacerbating the problem, but when Ryoga tells Mizael, he just grumbles incoherently and inches his quilt up over his face.

Neither of them have dealt well with the transition into being human, but Ryoga doesn’t doubt it’s been just as hard on everyone else too, in less visible ways. It’s not that taking care of all of the Barians is annoying or frustrating, it’s just that everyone had assumed Vector would be the only issue. Yet adjusting to being human again is clearly taking a toll on all of them.

“What should we do?” he asks Rio one night, when she’s channel-surfing and he’s attempting to finish off homework.

She shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s the kind of pain that’s in their heads, after all.”

“But you’d,” Ryoga hesitates, then sighs. “You’d know the most about that.”

“Yeah, but that was me,” Rio says, turning on the couch to face him. “And that was after I’d spent months in a hospital bed, not centuries in the Barian World. And besides, therapy's not a catch-all cure, it’s work.”

“Work they’d be willing to put in, though.”

“Not really.” Rio grimaces. “It depends. And I’m not sure how much they’d want to talk to either of us about personal things like that. Alit’s even refusing to talk to Gilag, and they’re like brothers.”

“Then who would they talk to?”

“Maybe Yuuma. Or, in Mizael’s case, Kaito. They’re the only humans they’ve actually connected with at all.”

The idea of dragging either of those two into Barian problems again makes Ryoga think twice, but there are only so many options at hand. “Fine, we’ll ask.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> siblings worrying about their found fam is soft and i enjoyed writing them


	2. case of mizael

When Ryoga calls Kaito, it’s unexpected but not completely unwelcome. Over the weeks since the Numeron Code reset the world, he’s assisted the leader of the Barians in making sure the rest are adjusting to their new life as humans.

But Kaito knows it’s been harder on some of them than others, and he knows that Mizael has refused to leave his room in the Kamishiro Mansion for anything other than to eat and to bathe, and those times are rare. So when Kaito arrives at the mansion and is led up to his room, he’s not sure what to expect other than a sleeping Mizael in a potentially bad mood.

He shuts the door behind him, letting his eyes adjust to the dark room. The curtains are shut, blinds pulled closed, and he can just about make out Mizael’s shape under the duvet on the bed.

“Is this what you’ve been reduced to?” he asks.

Mizael pulls down the quilt just enough to send a glare out. “Who the fuck let you in?”

“You look like trash.”

He’s not wrong. Mizael’s eyes are bloodshot, face swollen, and his hair is a mess. Once upon a time, he’d never let anyone see him so weak and unpolished. But as Kaito takes a seat next to him on the bed, he figures those rules don’t apply anymore.

Mizael rolls over, away from him.

“He’s been like this for weeks,” Ryoga had supplied the night before, over the short call where he’d asked him to help. He’d agreed, but he hadn’t known what exactly to expect. It hadn’t been this.

Kaito reaches out to grab Mizael’s shoulder and pull him onto his back. Mizael hisses in pain. “Where does it hurt?” he asks, looking over the skin he can actually see.

“Everywhere, you ass--”

“Sit up, let me take a look.”

Mizael grumbles, but finally acquiesces, getting up with some difficulty. When Kaito lifts up his shirt, there aren’t any bruises, no visible injuries. When he runs his hands along his spine, there’s nothing out of place. No knots in his shoulders that would hurt that badly even though Mizael gasps every time he so much as trails his fingers over his alabaster skin. Kaito frowns. No wonder Ryoga told him it’s all in his head.

“What have you been thinking about?” Kaito asks softly. “For you to be in this much pain? Ryoga said something about your memories.”

Mizael avoids his gaze, looking into his lap, twisting his hands together. His blonde hair falls over his shoulders in tangled snarls, messier than Kaito’s ever seen it. “It’s none of your business,” he says quietly.

“It is, though,” Kaito says. “At least, if I’m going to help you.”

“Well, I didn’t ask for your help, and I’m not fucking talking about it.”

“Fine, then I’ll leave--”

“No.”

It’s silent for a moment, and Kaito lets their words hang between them. Mizael scowls, clenching his trembling hands into fists in his duvet.

“Then tell me where it hurts.” But Mizael doesn’t answer, continuing to avoid his gaze. Kaito sighs. “I have an idiot-proof cure, but you have to tell me where it hurts or I can’t help you.”

“What kind of cure would that be?” Mizael asks. “Is it another pill?”

Ryoga had mentioned those too. Painkillers that didn’t do anything because there was no actual pain, no inflammation, just his mind playing tricks on him. Heating and cooling patches that only made him sweat or did nothing to numb the pain.

“It’s not,” Kaito says. “It’s better. But I can’t do anything if you don’t tell me anything. What’s wrong? Where does it hurt?”

“I already told you. Everywhere.”

“Lie down. On your stomach,” Kaito instructs. “And every time I touch a spot that hurts, you tell me.”

It had been arrows, if Ryoga recalled it correctly over the phone. Piercing arrows that shot him through, all over, until he’d bled out. Kaito grimaces. All of the Barians had hate-filled deaths, being killed over things they didn’t do or from accusations that weren’t true. He can only imagine what that did to Mizael, whose pride over being an honorable warrior is second to none.

“I don't want to."

"Do you not want to get better?"

Mizael hesitates. "I do, I just--"

“You're scared of who you'll be without the pain," Kaito murmurs. "Because that's a part of who you were, centuries ago, in your memories. But it doesn't have to be something that affects how you live today."

"I'm not scared."

“Okay, coward.”

Mizael whips around. “What did you call me--?”

Kaito’s hand shoots out to catch Mizael’s wrist, bringing the soft side to his lips. Mizael flushes a blotchy red. “A coward,” he says, pulling him closer and kissing the inside of his elbow.

Mizael flushes darker. “What are you doing?”

“There’s a thing humans do,” Kaito says, sliding his hands over Mizael’s shoulders and pressing another kiss to his collarbone, “when they get hurt. Do you know what it is?”

“N-no--”

Kaito presses their foreheads together. “We kiss it better.”

“That sounds stupid.”

“It works. I promise.”

Mizael shakes his head. “No.”

Kaito sighs, pulling away and gathering Mizael’s trembling hands in his. “Why not?”

He’s silent for so long that Kaito almost thinks the conversation is over, that maybe it’s time to give up and go home, but it doesn’t feel right leaving Mizael like this. Not when his face is swollen from crying and his hands won’t stop shaking. So instead, he waits it out patiently, watching Mizael bite his lip and struggle to order his thoughts.

“This pain isn’t only mine,” he finally says. “It’s the only connection I have left to Dragluon.”

Kaito’s brow furrows. The Numbers cards had disappeared when the Numeron Code reset everything. He hadn’t thought about it much beyond Yuuma losing his ace card, Aspiring Emperor, Hope. He hadn’t realized it meant Number 46: Dragluon too.

“Your partner, in your past life?” Kaito asks.

“This pain might be from my past,” Mizael says. “But he can’t be brought back, and the card is lost. So I just have to endure it again, to keep him with me.”

“Would Dragluon want that for you? For you to continue to be in pain and never move on?”

“I--”

“Wasn’t that the entire reason you became a Barian Emperor?” Kaito pushes. “Because you couldn’t move on?”

“That’s not the point--”

“No one who has ever stood by your side would want to see you suffer by yourself,” Kaito tells him. “Not Dragluon, and not me. You’ve endured enough.”

Then in the quietest voice, “But if I let it go, what will I have left?”

Kaito strokes his thumbs along Mizael’s knuckles. “You’ll have everything this second chance at life has to offer you. And you’ll miss it all if you continue like this.”

He huffs. “What makes you so sure your cure will work?”

“Because,” Kaito says with a soft smile, “the only way to cure something caused by hate is to fill it with love.”

It takes a moment for the words to settle between them, but when they do Mizael finally nods. “You didn’t have to be so goddamn poetic about it,” he says, before wrapping his arms around Kaito’s neck and kissing him first.

Kaito doesn’t have it in him to tell Mizael that’s not exactly how it works.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what losers, i love them


	3. case of alit

_ >> it works. _

Kotori squints at Kaito’s text on her D-Pad, trying to remember the context as their class breaks for lunch. When she does, she blushes.

It had been a last ditch suggestion, made when she’d been half-asleep talking to Rio over the weekend. Ever since the Numeron Code reset everything, the Barians have been struggling to adjust in their own ways, and Rio had been looking for suggestions that night. Solutions. Kotori had been half-joking, but…

It works.

She can’t help but smile as she gathers her books into her bag. Then she texts back.

_ >> good to know _

Alit sits a row in front of her and to the right in all of their classes. Kotori’s seen the skin on his neck from just over where his uniform’s collar hides it. Peeling and red raw, with scabs where his nails drew blood, but he pretends nothing is there. He smiles through conversations, gives it his all just like Yuuma in P.E., and is just as cheerful as always, but Kotori’s not stupid.

She knows when her friends aren’t acting like themselves. Yuuma’s easy to read and Alit’s even easier. A true heart-on-his-sleeve type who smiles too widely through his bad moods and only drops it when he thinks no one is watching. But Kotori’s been watching, and not only because she has a perfect view of him during class.

Before Alit can run off again, before Cathy can gather their group up for lunch in the cafeteria, Kotori slings her bag over her shoulder and pulls Alit out of the classroom.

“Wh-- Kotori?”

“We need to talk,” she says simply, leading him up to the school’s roof.

Once upon a time, he’d told them it’s his favourite spot in the entire school. Calming and quiet, with a view of the entire city. Or maybe he just missed being able to stand up on the ledge, unafraid of the drop with rock-hard skin and bones.

To be honest, it’s Kotori’s favourite spot too. The only place where she can breathe in peace, away from everyone else when it all gets to be too much.

Soon, he walks with her without her dragging him along, easily keeping her brisk pace. Lunch is only thirty minutes, after all, and Kotori doesn’t want to waste a second. Not when she knows it works.

“Aren’t we gonna eat lunch--”

“Sure we are. Together,” Kotori says, all nervous energy. She takes the steps two at a time with her bookbag rattling against her back. “Without the others.”

Something in Alit’s expression lights up, and she smiles. “Just us?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

Because they’re first years, they have to climb all three floors of the school. By the time they bust open the door to the roof, Kotori’s a little out of breath. Alit, however, is utterly fine.

The sky is blue, fluffy clouds only on the horizon, well away from the city. The sun is hot, but a cool breeze ruffles Kotori’s skirt. She smoothes it back down and puts on another smile to hide her hesitation as she sets her hand like a visor above her eyes.

“Let’s eat,” she says cheerfully, picking out a spot against the glass railings and heading toward it. “I brought an extra bento again today, so you can have it if you don’t like whatever the others made?”

“Oh my god, yes, your cooking is the best,” Alit says gratefully as she pulls both out of her bag. “It was Durbe’s day today, but he doesn’t know how to cook at all. I guess the only one of us who really can is Gilag.”

“Makes sense,” Kotori says as she slides the second one over to him along with a set of chopsticks with sakura blossoms decorating the ends. She shuffles closer to him, tucking her legs underneath her. “So,” she says.

“So?” Alit says, struggling with the chopsticks already. He manages to pick up one of the sushi rolls she’d made the night before with some difficulty.

She wonders what he’s used to using, what he’d used to eat with in his past life, but it’s the one topic he never talks about and she’s never had the courage to broach it even on such an innocuous thing. But today, Kotori has no choice. There’s no other way to help his issue other than to talk about it. She catches him scratching at the skin again, his clipped nails leaving jagged white trails.

“I’m worried about you,” she says, gently taking his wrist and pulling his hand away from his neck. “Does it… hurt?”

He blinks at her, then grins. “Does what hurt?” he asks, acting oblivious as he links their fingers together.

“Alit, you know what I’m talking about,” she says, unfazed. “Your neck. Does it hurt?”

He turns from her and focuses on the bento, letting go of her hand to try again with the chopsticks. Kotori watches him struggle for a moment before he gives up and wields them in a fist, stabbing them into the tamagoyaki she’d made. She sighs.

“I’m not the only one who’s worried about you.”

His shoulders cave. “I’m fine,” he lies, repeating the same line he’s said ever since they’d first noticed. But a week ago there weren’t scabs from bleeding and his eyes still smiled when his lips did.

“No, you’re not. And it’s okay that you’re not,” she says, letting her own fingers graze against his neck where it’s an angry red, blood at the surface just a hair away from bleeding. He hisses, then forces a smile that could melt any unsuspecting girl’s heart. But Kotori knows better. She can see the strain behind it.

“Really, Kotori. I’m fine,” he says. “It’s sweet how you dote over me, though.”

He goes to tuck a piece of her hair behind her ear, like he’s the one controlling this situation, like he’s calm and suave and everything she wants even though she doesn’t want him like this (broken up inside, lying through his teeth). Kotori thinks about Kaito’s text.  _ It works. _

She catches his hand and pulls him into her, carefully setting her hand against his shoulder, away from the tender skin of his neck. It all happens so fast, before she can really think it through, but her lips are on his and her eyes are screwed shut.

It’s not how she’d planned her first kiss to be, but it’s the only way she can think to get her feelings across. To make him look at her seriously.

When Kotori pulls away, Alit just stares at her.

“Huh--”

“I care about you, idiot,” she says simply, like her heart isn’t pounding. “And I can help, if you’d just let me. Rio said it’s psychosomatic.”

“Psycho-what?” He tilts his head at her, confused. “What does that mean?”

“That it’s caused by something in your head, like stress, or… memories,” she explains patiently, tentatively. “Please, tell me what happened. What’s wrong?”

Alit grimaces. “I don’t--”

“I know it’s hard, but don’t you want the pain to go away?”

“Yeah,” he admits, avoiding her gaze. “But I don’t know how.”

Kotori squeezes his hand. “I do. I promise, but you have to trust me enough to be honest with me.”

Alit runs a hand through his hair and frowns. “You’re right,” he says, demeanour changing immediately. His shoulders set back and his eyes harden, and it reminds her of how guarded he always looked in his Barian form, how he’s not really a middle-schooler with all the years he has behind him. “It’s my memories.”

“From when? The Barian World?”

He shakes his head. “No. Before then. When I was human. Do you know how I died?”

She has an inkling of what it could’ve been, but it’s only a guess from the way the redness on his neck circles all the way around, from his nape to his Adam’s apple. An uneven line of patchy redness and scabs.

“You’re smart, Kotori,” he says. “I bet you figured it out.”

She hesitates, but only because she doesn’t want to imagine it. Imagine this vibrant, beautiful boy in front of her having his life taken from him with the swing of an axe. “You were beheaded,” she says softly.

“Yeah.”

“Is that why it’s manifesting there?” Kotori asks, leaning in closer to loosen his tie so she can see it better. Her hands slide around his shoulders, under the shirt of his uniform, as close as she can get without touching the irritated skin as she inspects it. “Because you keep thinking about it?”

Kotori can feel his eyes on her, and momentarily she wonders if all of this is inappropriate. Then she realizes she doesn’t care. They’re alone up here and she’s already kissed him, after all.

“Not quite,” Alit says. “It’s because of who ordered it. I… thought he loved me.”

He says it like he’s dead, like it’s not making his neck itch and making his nails scratch, like it was so long ago that it doesn’t affect him when Kotori knows that it does. She wonders if that’s who he was thinking about when she kissed him, if he wished she was someone else.

“I love you,” Kotori says firmly, withdrawing her hands from his warm skin.

She’s doing everything backwards. She wonders how other girls do it, with confession notes in cursive or chocolates on Valentines Day. There’s no doubt in her mind that he’d appreciate those kinds of things. She can’t help but feel she’s screwing up, but she pushes forward anyway.

“And I exist now,” she continues before her courage runs out. “Not centuries ago. I know it’s hard, and you don’t want one thing to poison the rest of your good memories with him, but it already has. Holding onto that… I can’t even begin to imagine how much that hurts.”

“But… It’s not that easy, Kotori.”

“I can’t tell you how he felt about you. I can’t reassure you because I wasn’t there,” she says, stumbling as she rushes her words. “But I can’t imagine anyone close to you not loving who you are. You’re wonderful and deserving of so much. So, I love you, Alit. In place of anyone who might not.”

There’s a moment where they’re both silent. When Kotori finally deems it safe to look up at him, he’s crying. Silent tears roll down his cheeks and she wants to wipe them away, but she leaves him be, patiently waiting him out.

“You must think I’m so uncool,” he mumbles.

In the distance, the bell rings. They’re late for class, but this is more important than being present in the Duel Grounds for another lesson on trap cards.

“You’re the coolest person I know,” she says, at the very least fully confident in that.

Alit’s smile is watery, but it’s a real one this time. Kotori smiles back. “Did you… wanna try that again?” he asks, pointing at his lips. “I’m ready this time.”

This time, he kisses back, and Kotori realizes he’s much more experienced with it than she’ll ever be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> insert super steamy but middle-school appropriate makeout scene here which honestly sounds like a giant oxymoron
> 
> writing kotori was a lot of fun <3 she deserves nice things. so does alit~


	4. case of vector

It’s been a week since Alit told the entire Kamishiro household that he’s officially dating Mizuki Kotori. Similarly, it’s been a week since Mizael stopped sequestering himself in his room and moaning about being in pain.

How nice for them, Vector sneers as he gets ready for another day at school.

The only reason he’s even going to school today, sitting through dull classes and listening to Yuuma and his friends talk about typical middle-schooler bullshit, is because there is a test. And the last thing he’s about to do is flunk out for not being present for a stupid test when he knows Alit has been keeping track of their grades trying to outwit him.

Vector is not going to lose a contest he never signed up for. He’s not weak like Mizael, wanting to hold onto his past like an heirloom. He’s not lovelorn like Alit, worrying about his relationship status with a dead man.

He’s not stupid like the rest of them.

Vector’s well aware of the way everyone thinks he’s the problem child, and despite constant quips about dropping out, he doesn’t plan to. Not until next year, at least, when this whole schtick becomes well and truly boring.

For now, it’s not so bad. He sits at the back of the class, where he can watch everything unfold.

He crosses his arms, leans back in his chair, and watches. Kotori pulls out a soothing balm and applies it carefully to the skin around Alit’s neck that he’d rubbed raw. Alit blushes like an idiot as he watches Kotori with nothing but hearts in his eyes. Yuuma regales his friends with another story about Obomi and Orbital’s kids. He watches and he feels like an outsider.

How fucking cute for everyone.

A sharp pain shoots through his heart, but no one notices because all Vector does is tighten his grip on his biceps and grimace.

Vector’s heart hurts, but only because that’s where he’d stabbed his sword, carefully lining it up before pushing it through. He remembers wanting to end it all, and he had, coughing up blood on the throne to his kingdom. His death is different. He's not like Alit or Mizael. Vector wasn’t betrayed or killed by anyone he loved. He’d decided to die, and then made it happen with his own hands.

(So why does it hurt so much?)

Their teacher finally enters the classroom, greets the class to a chorus of “good morning’s,” and starts passing out the test that Vector’s here for.

He takes one glance through the questions and rolls his eyes. Math has never been his strong suit, but it’s definitely not Alit’s either. He’ll win, even just barely. Not that he’s counting. Vector glances up just in time to see Kotori shoot Alit a thumbs up. How adorable.

(His heart shutters and Vector grips the edges of the desk, exhaling as slowly as he can.)

Twenty minutes later, he’s the first one to hand the test in and leave. The last thing Vector plans to do is stick around and see what else the new couple is up to, or get pestered by an overly enthusiastic Yuuma about dueling during their free period.

No. He’s not dealing with that today.

~

“You left early today!”

Vector opens his eyes to see Yuuma leaning over the back of the couch at the Kamishiro Mansion, his pout out in full force. He grimaces.

“So?”

“I missed you!”

“So?” Vector asks again, not seeing the big deal. He can hear the others filing in through the front door, taking their sweet time taking off their shoes, hanging up their coats, and doing whatever else they do now that they’re all just happy middle schoolers.

Above him, Yuuma pouts at him even harder, crossing his arms and coming around to sit at Vector’s feet. “I wanted to duel you! And hang out! It’s like you don’t even wanna be with us.”

He doesn’t. He really, truly doesn’t. But Vector pastes on a smirk anyway. “You wanna be with me that badly?” he teases, ignoring the glare Nasch sends him as he passes them.

“Yeah!” Yuuma says, honest to a fault. “You should come to school for more than just tests.”

“Really?” Vector asks, slathering on fake curiosity as he sits up, folding his legs underneath him and shuffling closer. “Why?”

“Because school is fun! Better than being at home all day.”

“It’s fun? Is that why there are tests?”

“Okay,  _ those _ aren’t fun, but all our friends are there! And we get free period to duel, and lunch to eat together, and recess to hang out, and I don’t know why you keep disappearing.”

It’s almost pathetic how Yuuma insists that his friends are Vector’s too, using “our” like Vector gives a single fuck about any of them. “Because it’s boring,” Vector says. “I can OTK any one of you, and lunch tastes like sand, and recess is so short.”

As if those are his actual reasons and not what Alit had been complaining to Gilag about weeks ago when they’d all enrolled for lack of anything else to do.

“You just don’t get it,” Yuuma says emphatically. And then, much quieter, “Do you not like us?”

Vector hates them. All of them, with their middle school crushes, awkward hand-holding, and all the fucking blushing they all do. The same blushing Yuuma’s doing right now, a dusting of red across his cheeks as he stares at Vector, waiting for a response.

Disgusting.

But instead of saying any of that, Vector leans in closer. “You think I don’t like you?” he whispers conspiratorially with a loud giggle. “That’s  _ so _ funny--”

“It’s not--”

“I don’t just  _ like _ you, Yuuma,” Vector says, gathering his hands in his. “I--”

Nasch smacks him over the head and it only makes him laugh harder at the look of concern Yuuma’s face flashes.

“Shark! What’d you do that for?”

“He was about to--”

“That’s so mean!”

Vector grins sharply. “Yeah, Nasch,” he sings, caressing Yuuma’s offended little face. “That was  _ so _ mean. You wouldn’t want to upset Yuuma, would you?”

Because he’s seen those sappy expressions on Nasch too, always directed straight at Yuuma and no one else. And all of the blushing he does too. What a loser. God, middle schoolers really are the worst. How long does it take for them to grow up and stop it?

“Whatever,” Nasch says, like it doesn’t matter to him (but Vector knows better). When Yuuma’s not paying attention, he points at his eyes and then at Vector before walking away again.

Yuuma’s so close now, one of his hands ghosting over where Nasch had smacked him. There’s a crunch of skin between his eyebrows, gross concern that Vector doesn’t want.

“Are you alright?” he asks softly, like Vector’s about to break.

And maybe he is, because his heart stops, white-hot lightning lancing through it at the look in his wide worried eyes. Vector clenches his fists and tries to suck in another breath.

“I don’t wanna force you to do stuff you don’t want to,” Yuuma says like Nasch had never interrupted. “If you really don’t wanna be around, I guess that’s okay.”

Vector overheard Kotori last week, red-faced as Yuuma had asked about Alit. How they’d kissed and the pain faded away, and how she knew it would work because Kaito told her it would. Then later, when Alit pulled Mizael aside at home and asked if it had been the same for him.

Vector’s not lovesick over his murderer. He wasn’t betrayed by people who’d once loved him. He isn’t  _ like them _ .

(But Yuuma’s so close and--)

The space between them feels suffocating.

“... Vector? Are you listening?”

He blinks, the whole room coming back into focus. “Huh?”

“You don’t look too good,” Yuuma says, his hand coming to rest against his forehead. “Are you sick?”

“No.”

“Then--”

“It’s nothing, Yuuma. Go home.”

Vector gets up, about to abscond to his room and forget anything ever happened. Forget about the gentle way Kotori’s fingers smooth lotion across Alit’s neck, or the way Mizael perks up every time that asshole Kaito is so much as mentioned. And definitely forget about Yuuma and all of his stupid unnecessary concern because Vector is fine and he doesn’t need any of them because his heart is fucking fine--

“Vector, wait.”

Yuuma’s hand catches his and he whips around. “What?” he bites.

“Just in case,” he says, before kissing him chastely on the lips.

It lasts all of a second, enough to jumpstart Vector’s heart into overdrive, but not enough to close his eyes and enjoy it. Instead, he’s just shocked. Appalled, because he liked it exactly as much as he thought he would and that’s just awful.

“Okay,” Yuuma says after a full terrifyingly awkward moment has passed. “I’ll go now.”

Vector stares at him, for once totally speechless as he walks back toward the entryway and starts lacing his shoes up. What the--

“See you at school, Vector!”

And then he’s gone.

The sound of Rio’s laughter breaks his daze, soon followed by Alit and Gilag. Vector turns to see them all sitting in the kitchen, having witnessed exactly everything that had just transpired.

“Feel better, Vec?” Alit asks when he’s calmed down enough to get it through his giggles.

“Fuck you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and our kissfic adventure is over <3 hope u enjoyed vector making an ass of himself ;3

**Author's Note:**

> tfw u try to write something trashy but then riddle it with angst instead


End file.
